larp?” he asks with what looks like genuine confusion on his face.
I roll my eyes. “Like you don’t know it means live action role playing. Good for you, you stay in character very well. Now, why don’t you go find your clothes so you don’t freeze to death and then find some other girl in the woods to mess with.”
“If I become too cold I will return to my raven form.”
Oh, yeah. I forgot about all that shape shifting stuff that happened back there. The pounding in my head must have pushed that from my consciousness. It had to have been some kind of trick. Some smoke and mirrors thing or something. “Well, then why don’t you change back into your ‘raven form’ and fly away,” I say as I start walking again. “Your friends are probably missing you.”
“They are not my friends and they will be incapacitated for a while.” He has fallen into step next to me now and I have to keep my eyes straight ahead so as not to get the full show of his nakedness. A part of me really, really wants to take a peek, though.
“Why, did you throw a paint ball at them and now they have to play dead for a while?” I ask not even bothering to hide the sarcasm in my voice.
“No, I threw a Fae dart at them which will keep them in a weakened state for the next twenty-four hours.”
“Why not just kill them?” I ask facetiously.
“It is not the way of the Sheehogue to kill another,” he says as if that is universally understood. Then he adds almost under his breath, “Unless it is for the greater good.”
“And I suppose you get to decide what the greater good is?” The sarcasm just keeps dripping from my mouth. I’m hoping he’ll get the hint soon that I don’t believe a word of what he’s saying.
“Yes.”
“Well, good for you. You obviously aren’t going to kill me or you would have already so go away.”
“I have not decided that yet.”
I steal a glance at his face and he looks perfectly serious. Maybe he really is deciding whether or not he’s going to kill me. Great, the first boy I meet in years who’s my age and he’s a naked sociopath. I need to get out of here and if I make it home I will never, ever, take a walk in the woods again. And I’m not letting Zac out of my sight either. Picking up my pace, I’m relieved when I can finally see my house. “Okay, seriously, my parents are not going to be pleased if they see me walking with a naked boy so you really have to go away, like now.”
“I am duty bound to protect you from the Pooka. Whether I like it or not,” he adds with a sideways glance towards me.
“That doesn’t sound reassuring,” I remark. Ten more yards and I’m home.
“It was not meant to be. I am not here of my own will and this is not the course of action I would have chosen if it was for me to decide.”
“What would you have decided?”
“I believe keeping you alive is too much of a risk.”
Great, I think I may actually need to get Dad’s shotgun out. I’m about to make a cutting remark when Kallen falls to his knees with a grimace on his face. “What’s wrong with you?”
“It seems your mother is more intelligent than I originally thought. I am not able to move forward or back.”
Could he get any stranger? “What, like you’re stuck?”
With a glower he says, “You are very astute.”
“Well, how do you get unstuck so you can go away?”
“He can only move if I set him free,” Mom says from behind me scaring the crap out of me. How long had she been watching us?
I turn to face her and I have never seen her so angry. She looks at Kallen and says, “I will never give my daughter to the Pooka king and allow your kind to roam free in our world.” Okay, I’m pretty sure I am having an awful